“ZeroZeroZero” thoughts, Season One, Episode Six: “En El Mismo Camino”

Two scenes, two minutes: That’s all you’re getting of the Lynwood family saga in ZeroZeroZero Episode 6. The fate of their cocaine shipment and the money owed on it? The subject of two or three lines of throwaway dialogue half a world away. The Italians who purchased it to begin with? Not present at all.

For this episode, it’s Manuel’s world, and we just live in it.

Directed by Pablo Trapero from a script by Leonardo Fasoli and Max Hurwitz, “En El Mismo Camino” is a breathless nightmare journey into the life—I hesitate to say “mind,” since he remains so sociopathically opaque—of Manuel Quinteras, the special forces soldier turned chief muscle for the Leyra Brothers cartel. Only he’s much more than that: He’s the commander of an entire army of young men he’s training to become perfect killers, just like himself and his squad mates. Though known to the outside world as the Firm, they take their internal name from Manuel’s old callsign: They’re the Vampires.

I reviewed the extraordinary sixth episode of ZeroZeroZero for Decider.

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